Let’s talk about the elephant in the room: disrespect and ignorance towards ASPECT RATIOS.

I know it makes me sound like an elitist, but I’m simply not watching anything that’s been edited so poorly, regardless of the content. I don’t want to see photos taken with your thumb on the lens, watch video recorded with the lens cap on, nor check out something that’s just out-of-focus altogether – same diff. Is it wrong that I find it just a little bit insulting that I’m supposed to ignore random funhouse-mirror freak-out special effects?

I can only think of a few explanations for this behavior: the editor either isn’t aware of aspect ratio issues, doesn’t know how to correct them, or thinks things look fine as-is. All those cases scream, “I’m not someone who should be tasked with making videos”.

]]>By: Julien Couvreurhttp://boingboing.net/2011/12/01/why-the-study-of-evolution-mat.html#comment-1285179
Fri, 02 Dec 2011 00:51:00 +0000http://boingboing.net/?p=132524#comment-1285179Best talk on evolution: http://w-uh.com/posts/110907-evolution.html (Why evolution is true). It’s much better than the one above, which only offers sound bites.
]]>By: brainologisthttp://boingboing.net/2011/12/01/why-the-study-of-evolution-mat.html#comment-1285170
Fri, 02 Dec 2011 00:43:00 +0000http://boingboing.net/?p=132524#comment-1285170As a scientist, I’m terribly disappointed in the quote that opens this post. It may seem like it’s clever, highlighting the fundamental importance of evolution by relating it to the “basic” units of the alphabet; unfortunately, the analogy falls apart completely, and in fact a bit self-destructively, once you know a little bit about the science of language.

Sentence structure (syntax) has nothing to do with the alphabet. There is no natural human language whose syntax depends at all on an alphabet. Moreover, there are numerous examples of languages (say, the Chinese languages) that have no alphabet, but whose syntax can still be described.

Alphabets are arbitrary ways of encoding the sounds of language in static, visual form. What’s worse, alphabets are invented by humans as a tool for recording language. It’s a dangerous analogy to make to suggest that evolution is invented by people.

Let me hazard another analogy in the same form as the quote above “Teaching science without teaching evolution is like teaching calculus without Roman numerals.”

Although the intent is noble, and the video is otherwise one of the best I’ve seen for conveying fundamental importance of evolution to science, the rampant misinformation people have about linguistics is always disappointing.

(For the people at home playing “irony bingo”: syntax is an evolved capacity of the human mind, whereas alphabets are intelligently designed…)

]]>By: Joseph Brownhttp://boingboing.net/2011/12/01/why-the-study-of-evolution-mat.html#comment-1285107
Thu, 01 Dec 2011 23:52:00 +0000http://boingboing.net/?p=132524#comment-1285107good grief, watch the video before you take a sentence fragment out of context
]]>By: laukarluenghttp://boingboing.net/2011/12/01/why-the-study-of-evolution-mat.html#comment-1285082
Thu, 01 Dec 2011 23:10:00 +0000http://boingboing.net/?p=132524#comment-1285082Is she saying that to understand gravity or atomic structure I must know evolution first? If so, then it’s a rather silly argument.

I hate these stupid debates, because they skirt the core issue: forced schooling is immoral whether a creationist or an evolutionist does it. The politicization of the educational industry has been a massive mistake.